


It will be long (but I’ll be here)

by JustMeWriting



Series: Aro/Ace Kageyama Tobio [3]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alloaro Character, Aromantic Character, Bisexual Character, Coming Out, Gen, Growing Up, Masturbation, Sexual Content, Siblings, Trans Male Character, you can skip it tho
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-24
Updated: 2020-03-25
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:40:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23297944
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JustMeWriting/pseuds/JustMeWriting
Summary: Tobio grows. He tells his sister he’s a boy, tells her about boys, tells her about girls, and tells her about aromanticism. It takes years. He gets here. He gets help, sometimes. There’s a girl, or a flag- and he has a new word for himself that fits just right, like a jacket you never grow out off.That’s good enough.
Relationships: Kageyama Tobio & Kageyama Tobio’s sister
Series: Aro/Ace Kageyama Tobio [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1595422
Comments: 4
Kudos: 63





	1. Boy

**Author's Note:**

> Hi ! If you read the last chapter that got out, you know where I’m coming from. If you haven’t, I’d still call this spoiler free. It generally follows the story, although I don’t go into too much details as this is mostly focuses on Tobio’s growing up and understanding his identity and such.
> 
> Anyhow. I like my characters with complex, changing identities who are supported by friends and family. Here he comes.

  
It’s dark.

The shutters are closed, of course, because the moon is high and full and it’s too much light for his sister.

He can’t sleep.

There’s the faint moon rays, the few that manage to slip between the cracks of the wood, that fall on his chest and face and hands. He likes it.

His sister is sleeping, next to him. She has a bed, because she’s older and there isn’t enough place for both of them. In a few years, Tobio will sleep in her place when she’s kilometres away, in the big city, in a one bedroom apartment and she’ll go back to futons on the floor because there won’t be enough space. They’ll have rooms for themselves, then.

He can hear her breaths. It’s a little whistle, and it swirls in the air and mixes with the low hum of the AC. If he focuses, he can hear the faint buzz of the computer on the desk.

He can’t sleep. It’s not that unusual. Before tests, before tournaments, before oral presentations and summer camps, he can never sleep.

But this time it’s not volleyball or school keeping him up. It’s a feeling of discomfort, of wrongness, of not belonging in his own skin that he can’t shake. He think he should be used to it by now. It’s been like that for so long.

He knows he’s a boy. No one else does, it seems. That’s strange, because it’s so obvious to him. What else could he be ?

He turns around, and there’s a sigh above him. His sister’s voice is rough from sleep, and the words are barely here, muffled by the pillow, but he understands anyway. 

“Can’t sleep ?”

“No.”

There’s another sigh, and then nothing for a few seconds. His sister turns around and gets closer to the edge of the bed, so they can see each other. It’s dark and the moon barely shows her pale skin.  We have the same skin,  he thinks. Like mom and grandpa. 

“What is it ? You don’t have a test, do you ?“

“No, that’s not it.”

“Well, tell me.”

He stays silent. They tell each other everything, he thinks. Almost. She hasn’t told him about the girl she kissed in the backyard when she thought no one was home, but he wasn’t supposed to be here anyway and he knows better than to force her to tell him things she doesn’t want to tell. She can be scary, sometimes. 

He’s not really scared. Just a bit. Enough for his voice to shake when he finally speaks.

“I’m a boy, I think.”

There’s more silence. She uses her elbows to push herself up and, even in the dark, he know she’s looking right at him. 

“A boy ?”

“Yes. A boy.”

“Okay.”

“Okay ?”

“Okay, brother.”

Oh.

He’s crying before he notices. 

That night, they sleep together. The bed is too small for both of them, so they have to almost hug to keep one of them from falling over the edge. It’s a bit uncomfortable but Tobio doesn’t mind it, because his sister is caressing his hair and she’s calling him her brother, and that’s good. That’s enough. 


	2. Boys

  
When he figures what is it about boys that make his face grow hotter, she’s already almost out of high school. He’s still in middle school.

They switch who sleeps in the bed and who sleeps on the futon every week. She told him about how she kissed girls just to see, and she doesn’t stutter anymore when she says ‘That’s Tobio, my brother.’

They’re a little less close than before. She started talking about boyfriends and soulmates and Tobio just.. can’t keep up. He doesn’t understand love at all.

They still give secrets to each other. Tobio tells her about his volleyball team and she’s proud of him, he knows it, sees it in the way her eyes shine when he explained the quirk he managed to do in a difficult situation. She comes to all the matches she can, and when they go home they always stop by the grocery store to buy pork buns. They race up the hill, and the wind in Tobio’s hair never feels better than in these moments (except when he tosses and they spike and they win, maybe.).

It’s isn’t night when he tells him, this time. It’s spring and the window is open. It lets little leaves and flowers fall inside, and Tobio knows he’ll have to swipe them up before bed because it’s his turn on the futon.

She’s on the bed, working on the computer, while Tobio tries to do his math homework. Key word,  tries . Well, he won’t need math for volleyball anyway, so he gives up pretty fast.

He looks around, and finds he has nothing to do. Guess he could train some more. He gets up from the chair and scoops up the ball under his arm. He should probably take a jacket because the temperature drops fast here, but he’s always sworn he wasn’t sensitive to the cold. He can’t let her know  now that he actually gets cold super fast.

He opens the door and she doesn’t even lift her head up. She’s used to it.

The house is small and empty, and he tells her suddenly:

« I like boys. »

She finally looks at him. He knows he’s blushing a bit, and he clears his throat before looking away. 

« I’m going to the backyard. »

« Okay. Be careful. »

« I’m not a baby, and it isn’t even dangerous. I’m literally like, 5 metres away from here. »

« Anything could happen. You could get kidnapped and I wouldn’t know because I’m so focused on what I’m doing, or... »

He knows she’s joking. 

« Or you could see a cute boy and throw your ball right in his face because you’re distracted. And then you would ruin your chance to woo him. »

« What ? What do you- moo ? What’s that ? Did you just invent it ? »

« Hey, language young man. And I didn’t invent it, look it up. »

Tobio frowns. He hates when she uses words he doesn’t understand (so, of course, she does it all the time.)

He doesn’t see any cute boy this afternoon.

He doesn’t mind it. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is short - the longest is the last one !


	3. Oh, girls ?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s a tall, sweet girl in Tobio’s class. He doesn’t meddle with girl, but he can’t stop thinking about how her skin looks soft and-
> 
> But boys are better anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ⚠️ This chapter has sexual content ! Tobio masturbates, and he’s in middle school. If you want to skip it because you’re not comfortable with that, don’t read between the **⚠️
> 
> Anyway uh that’s my first. Smut thing. It isn’t very much detailed. This chapter is more self indulgent because obviously what I write is based on my experience. Dysphoria is talked about in passing and shouldn’t trigger anyone but if it’s a sensitive subject consider not reading this chapter.

  
There’s a cute girl in his class. She’s tall and sweet, and Tobio tries not to look at her too much. It’s weird. 

He never associated with girls. He never associated with lots of people in general, but, apart from her sister he doesn’t... talk to girls. It’s probably just his own insecurities and his dysphoria that scream that he looks like them when they’re near and he knows it’s stupid, but he can’t help it. He doesn’t to talk to girls. He doesn’t meddle with them, never. He doesn’t even look at them. 

Boys are cooler. Boys are everything he wants to be, in that weird everyone-is-actually-unique-and-not-two-boys-are-similar way. 

Tobio thinks he might be a little mean with girls. They don’t mean to harm or make him feel bad, he knows it. Beside, everyone thinks he’s a boy. Which, they’re right. He is. And the school allows him to be called Tobio and to have the boy’s uniform and it fits so much better than the ugly skirts he used to wear in his last school. 

Boys are better but still, there’s this girl and she’s tall and her hair looks soft. Her skin does to, and Tobio finds himself wanting to touch it. She’s strong, so she could probably lift him and, he wouldn’t complain. They could kiss and he’d feel her stomach against his finger and she’d shiver at his touch. And she would touch him too, a bit, not everywhere but-

Shit. He’s really thinking about that in the middle of class. Fuck. 

His team hates him. He knew it, kind of. He knew some of them were jealous of his ´natural talent’ (bullshit, he’s just been playing since forever and he always took volleyball seriously, contrary to most of them).

It still hurts. 

He comes home, and his sister is not here. It’s hard to have intimacy when you share a room, so they found a system. When one of them text the other ‘Can you go grab some milk ?’, they make sure to stay away for an hour or two. They never ask what the other used their time for. That’s not something Tobio wants to know (he’s seen people sneak out of his window multiple time, and he can’t imagine what he could have seen had he came just a little earlier. ) 

He texted her, because he wants to be alone. She wasn’t here to see his match. He’s glad, because he can’t deal with anything right now- he throws his uniform somewhere in the corner and falls on the bed, all sweaty and gross. He thinks vaguely of the boy he met, the one who jumped higher than anyone would’ve expected and who promised him he would beat him. He was kinda cool. 

But he can’t think of volleyball right now, so he thinks of the tall girl in his class and he feels hot all over. 

He thinks of her hair and he feels a bit guilty for using a classmate like that, but he won’t see her next year anyway. He’s sad and frustrated and he just wants to relax and take a nap that ends up being too long, where he’ll wake up having forgotten where he is and who he is. 

**

The guilt goes away, and he thinks of her stomach and her thighs and his hand goes down by itself. 

He touches himself while thinking of her, of the sound she would make against him. He thinks of kissing her skin and touching her chest and her stomach rolls and he hums when he finds the perfect place to touch. She seems so comfortable to hug. He would take her in his arms and taste her on his tongue, leaving wet trails on her arms and down her thighs. She’d shiver and moan, and he would, too, and she’d whisper his name when she comes, his fingers brushing her insides softly. He would taste her on his fingers, just to see if it’s different from his. 

They could do it slow or fast, it doesn’t matter. It’s all in his head. He can imagine he has a cock to press inside her, and it would be tight and hot, just like he read. He would push inside and she’d rock her hips in synch, and the bed would protest under them. He would come, deep in her, and then he’d hide the condom under candy wrappers in the bin. 

They would have to shower and they would both be tired and sleepy after, but she wouldn’t stay. He doesn’t want her too - he just wants to touch her body and taste her on his tongue. 

**

When his sister comes back home, he already changed the sheets. She doesn’t ask.    
  


(He tells her, later, how he feels about girls. She nods like she knew, and she tells him about that time she kissed her friend in the backyard. He doesn’t say that he was here.)


	4. Ew, Romance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s a flag on Tsukishima’s wall, green, white, grey and black. Tobio wonders but doesn’t ask, until he does and Tsukishima tells him to look it up in a way that sounds less like ‘you’re too dumb to know that ?’ And more like ´I think you might need to know that’.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is four Words pages long ? That’s. Long, for me. Anyway, here’s the last chapter ! I’m not sure I’m satisfied with it :/

Living without his sister next to him is new, and scary. Karasuno too, is new and scary. 

He gets used to both. 

He understands his flaws, slowly. It takes a long time for him to stop seeing the ball falling on the floor, where the spiker should be but isn’t. It takes a long time for him to trust the team, but he gets there. 

He misses his sister and his grandpa less, and he runs up hills with Hinata besides him and it feels right. They become friends somewhere along the way, until Hinata calls him his best friend and oh. That’s new. But Tobio doesn’t hate it, and he feels strangely shy when he tells his sister. She just laughs and say it was obvious. 

Hinata and him mostly talk about volleyball. They don’t have a lot of deep conversations about anything else. When Tobio tells him he’s trans, he nods, asks for pronouns, and tell him his sister is too. 

After that, Hinata starts talking about Kenma and Lev and Yamaguchi a bit more, and it’s softer. Tobio still doesn’t understand all of that, the butterflies in your stomach (that’s a metaphor, right ? Right ??), the longing and daydreaming of holding hands. 

When he daydreams of holdings hands, most of the time they’re pinned to a bed. He really tries to understand what Hinata and his sister tell him about love, he even read a few shojos they lend him, but he still doesn’t get it. 

He’s sure as hell that he doesn’t want to date anyone. That would be so much trouble. He wouldn’t have time for volleyball, or they would complain, or things would go wrong- he doesn’t want that type of relationship, and when Hinata asks him if he ever had crushes, he just shrugs. He doesn’t know what crushes are supposed to feel like either. 

Strangely, the answer to all of this comes years later, from Tsukishima. 

Time pass by. He’s out of high school, and he plays professionally. He hasn’t seen Hinata in a year, and the FaceTimes when it’s early for one and late for the other aren’t enough to keep him from missing his best friend. His sister is still in school, working hard toward a psychologist degree Tobio is sure she’ll have. 

He has a team, a good one, whom he trust and who trust him too. 

He had a girlfriend once, and it lasted three days before it got annoying. His ex-boyfriend lasted barely longer. When people ask, he says he’s bi and stops at that. He doesn’t tell them how strange it feels to only want people in a sexual way, how he sometimes feel predatory and sick for not being able to appreciate tender words and I love you s from people who aren’t family. 

It’s not like he cares about other people’s opinion, anyway. Only his team, maybe, and his friends, for sure. His sister has already seen him at his worst, he can’t dig any deeper. 

Today’s a special day. It took a few months, but he managed to plan a meet-up with Yamaguchi, Tsukishima and Yachi. Of course, Hinata is still countries away and he couldn’t come, but Tobio also misses his other friends. 

They gradually got closer in high school, and even with what life threw on everyone’s way, they managed to keep in contact. 

They decided to meet in a coffee shop a city away and then to go visit Tsukishima‘s place, because it‘s close and he moved in recently. 

The meet is great. The coffee is good, and everyone has a lot to tell after so long. Yachi really likes her job, and she promises if they need her that she’ll do it for free (they protest of course, but she’s gotten toughest with years and she defends her position all she can). 

Yamaguchi and Tsukishima are still in school, and, obviously, Tobio’s job mostly consist of training and wining. 

They head to Tsukishima’s in the afternoon, and the wind is cold against Tobio’s cheeks. He feels good. 

Tsukishima’s apartment is as small as you would imagine. There’s two rooms, and it’s cleaner than Tobio’s bedroom has ever been. In the first room, there’s a little kitchen, a sofa and no television. Even his homework is properly  piled up in the corner of a table. 

The other room is the bedroom. The futon is nowhere in sight, probably folded properly in the closet. There’s a desk and a chair, a computer, a window so small it barely lets any air in and, on the walls, lessons and  shelves full of plastic dinosaurs. There’s also something else. A flag, of two shades of green, white, grey and black. It’s stuck to the wall with pins, and the edges are bit f rayed , like it’s been here for a long time. 

Tobio wonders, but doesn’t ask right away. They go back to the living room, manage to find enough place on the sofa and on the floor, and Tsukishima makes tea for everyone. 

Tobio is the first to go. There’s not a lot of trains, and he has to wake up early for training tomorrow. He likes his eight hours of sleep when he can. (He still has trouble falling asleep before the tournaments, though he can manage better now. Some things never change.) 

Tsukishima comes to the door with him, and just before the door is closed behind him, Tobio finds himself letting a ‘Wait !’ neither of them expected. 

“What is it ? Did you forget something?”

“No I... the flag ? In your bedroom. What is it ?”

Tsukishima looks at him for a while, quiet. Tobio wonder what he sees. 

“It’s an aromantic flag. You should probably look it up. Now go, you’re going be late and I’m  not taking the blame.”

At that he closes the door, and let Tobio on the  doormat , lost. 

The travel to the train station is long. Tobio is confused, to say the least. He has no idea what aromantic is- is it a country ? Why would Tsukishima have a country flag in his room ? Then again, aromantic kind of sound like that other word he knows. Ace... asexual ? It sounds like that. And that’s an LGBTQ+ identity. Tsukishima told him to look it up, but it sounded different than when he does that for other words he doesn’t know. There wasn’t as much ‘you’re dumb’ implied, more like he though it could really interest Tobio. 

He’s giddy when he opens a new google page on his phone, once he’s on the train. He has at least an hour of travel to do. That’s plenty of time to search it up. 

The first thing that come up is the definition of romantic attraction. Then, a few videos, but Tobio let his earbuds at home and he’s not comfortable enough to watch things in public for everyone to hear. Finally, he find a definition of the word. 

Aromantic :An  aromantic is a person who experiences little or no romantic attraction to others

[(http://wiki.asexuality.org/Aromantic)](http://wiki.asexuality.org/Aromantic)

He read a bit more. Finds blogs on tumblr that explain all the different micro-identities and it gets a bit overwhelming at some point, so Tobio closes the tab and looks out of the window. He’s almost home. 

Once he’s on his bed, the first message he sends is to Tsukishima. 

‘Thanks’

‘You’re welcome. So, aro ?’

‘Yeah, I guess.’

‘Okay.’

The conversation stops here. It’s usually like this, with them. They don’t talk to each other a lot, not as much as Tobio talks to Yamaguchi or Yachi. They don’t share a lot of deep things unless the other are here too, but they have each other’s back when it count and, yeah, Tobio can call Tsukishima a friend without feeling weird about it anymore. 

The next person he texts is his sister. She’s still far away, and he still misses her, but they call each other at least once a week (they want to call more, of course they do, but between Tobio’s training and his sister’s homework, it gets difficult to find time) and they still share most things.

He doesn’t call her, because she’s probably busy.

He writes ‘ Hey. How are you ? ’ And then ‘ I’m aromantic, bisexual and trans. Love you. ’

She texts him back hours later, and it’s a smiling emoji with an ‘ I love you, too. And I’m proud of you. ’ that warms his heart.

He texts Hinata the next day, once he really processed everything. He feels better. He didn’t notice how much it bothered him, before. He feels like they’re a weigh that’s been taken off of his shoulders when he didn’t even know it was here.

He knows there’s a lot of coming outs he still have to do. He knows it might change, his identity, what he feels, how he feels, what he uses to express it. He used trans and gay and bi and bisexual aromantic, and all of that felt right at some point.

Maybe it’ll change. Maybe. But for now, his windows are open and his hair dances in front of his eyes, and his room smells like coffee and deodorant, and he feels right in his skin. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks a lot for reading this ! Please tell me what you liked or disliked about it, tell me if I wrote something wrong, or give constructive criticism ?

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you liked that ! If there are mistakes in the writing please tell me.


End file.
